Akira Date
is a combat medic who traveled the world much like Eiji Hino, who he saw in Africa during a Civil War and had an Automatic Colt Pistol bullet stuck in his brain after being shot which causes him great pain at times. When he comes back to Japan he is hired by the Kougami Foundation to be the user of the Kamen Rider Birth system as well as the first one to use it. He takes up the job as Birth so to earn one hundred million Yen for the surgery to remove the said bullet. The bullet causes him greater pain over time and starts to affect his performance in battle. After taking up Dr. Maki's offer to work for the Greeed with a bribe, he reveals that he was doing so at Kougami's behest, which would earn him the amount of money enough to afford his surgery. He was later wounded on the job to the point where he can no longer fight effectively and resigned his position from the Kougami Foundation, obtaining his money and leaves the country to get his surgery done with Shintaro succeeding him. Later, he returns after recuperating from his surgery and becomes the user of Birth Prototype Version to fight against the Greeed. Personality Date is a happy-go-lucky man who hates reading manuals and has a tendency in mixing up names (he often calls Ankh as "Anko"). Despite this, he enjoys getting his job done perfectly and believes risking big in order to win big, thus proclaiming that he'll be taking all the cell medals from here on out. Date is a people person, admitting his own desire, yet he makes it a personal rule of his to not use others to reach his goal, as well as not doing anything that will make him cry. He is also somewhat reckless, getting Ankh in a line of fire while fighting the Kabuto and Kuwagata Yummy. Date is also known to love eating oden, even making oden in Kiyoto Maki's research lab, while at the same time taking up residence and making a big mess out of it, much to Maki's ire. He has taken a liking to Shintaro Goto, training him in order to take up the mantle of Birth once his job is over. He has a big brother-little brother/father-son dynamic with Shintaro and he is always happy to see the latter grow. When he comes back to Japan after his surgery and sees how his "son" has now becomes his own man and doing better than he was before, he exclaimed that "father is happy". Before battle, Date tends to say . In the battle with the Unicorn yummy he shown difficulty in battle that may be involved with a bullet that is lodged in his brain. His fighting style as Birth is a combination of mixed martial arts and pro wrestling techniques, as shown in particular against the Omu and Unicorn Yummy. Due to his dislike for reading manuals, his use of the Birth system tends towards the "learn as you go" approach and as such, he is not as effective as Shintaro when it comes to using the exosuit and its armaments. Story ﻿Date first appeared as Birth while using the Breast Cannon on Mezool as the Mega Greeed Out of Control to damage her and release two of Uva 's Core Medals. For the rest of his time as Birth he would fight the Yummy to collect their Cell Medals while also helping some of their hosts and assisting OOO when needed. He also trains Goto to take his position after finishing his task as Birth. But over time, the bullet in his head gave him greater pain, causing him to collapse during battles. Maki bribed Date to betray Kougami and join his side, which Date accepted as he starts supporting the Greeed. But in reality, Date faked the betrayal under orders from Kougami to stop Maki from becoming a Greeed. When the Greeed injures Date in retaliation, knocking him unconscious, it gave Goto the motivation to use the Birth Driver and avenge Date's "death". Though it turned out that he was in no mortal danger from the Greeeds' attack, Date decides to let Goto become the new Kamen Rider Birth. He uses the danger policy he signed with the Kougami Foundation to collect ¥50 million so he can travel abroad to have surgery done to remove the bullet from his brain. Along with the ¥50 million that Maki paid him, he now has the ¥100 million yen he wanted for his surgery and to set up a medical school in the country where he and Eiji were involved in a civil war. Later, he returned to Japan once again and became the user of Kamen Rider Birth Prototype Version to fight against Greeed. OOO, Den-O, All Riders: Let's Go Kamen Riders As all of the primary Kamen Riders face the Great Leader of Shocker, Date led all of the secondary riders (including the dark riders) to support the primary riders. Movie War Mega Max Akira returns to Japan for aiding Satonaka after receiving a call about the berserk Kamen Rider Poseidon. He fights it by transform into Birth Prototype but lost easily and even the aid from Goto won't help. As the result, the Proto-Birth Driver was damaged and Akira was later hospitalized alongside Goto. At the next day, he returns alongside with Goto to help Eiji for some minutes without transforming. Of course he is defeated as a result. In the end, he helps Chiyoko clean up Cruise Crousier after the battle is finished. Super Hero Taisen .]] Date and Goto arrive to assist Eiji in fighting Bujira and his offshoots. Once Gokai Red and Kamen Rider Diend finish their battle, Gokai Red wipes Birth and Proto-Birth out. When Gokai Red and Kamen Rider Decade were revealed to acted like a villain, Birth and Proto-Birth, along with any Riders and Sentai warriors are actually in another strange dimensions where they are held, as both Decade and Gokai Red set them free and the time for counterattack against Dai-Shocker and Dai-Zagyack. Kamen Rider OOO (novel) While out of boredom, Date writes a short story about the Birth Drivers. Despite being sentient, the belt isn’t capable of speaking human language. At one point the belt says “Sometimes I just want to scream, but then I realize I can’t.” But it is still able to communicate with other items, such as the Proto Birth Driver and other Candroids. The belt recollects his memories with Date and Goto, he goes on to praise Date by saying how strong he is, how masculine he is and how much fun they had together. Goto on the other was too unreliable and weak in the beginning, Birth Driver eventually came to accept Goto. The Prototype Birth Drive that was destroyed in Mega Max makes a brief appearance and says “A transformation belt that can’t transform is just a regular belt. Actually, it’s even worse. A regular belt is at least used as to keep someone’s pants up! I can’t even do that. I’m just a heavy object around the waist!” Doctor Maki also makes a minor appearance by creating a Yummy from the Birth Driver. The Yummy is called Kamen Rider Death and looks similar to Kamen Rider Birth, but he’s not really a Kamen Rider. The Candroids, Mr. Gori (a Gorilla Candroid) and Mr. Tiger (a Tiger Candroid) as the Birth Driver refers them as, destroy the Yummy. Nobunaga is the lord of the , that greatly resembles Akira Date. He was killed by Kamen Rider Bujin Gaim after HON-NOHJI castle that he lodged in was set on fire. Nobunaga is portrayed by , who previously portrayed Akira Date/Kamen Rider Birth from Kamen Rider OOO. Video Game appearances All Kamen Rider: Rider Generation Akira Date appears as Birth in the first installment of All Rider: Rider Generation. In the second installment, he appears as Proto-Birth. His special move in the first is used by Goto in the second installment while he has his own more close combat movement. Kamen Rider Climax Heroes Akira Date appears as both Birth and Proto-Birth in Climax Heroes Fourze and Super Climax Heroes. He will use Proto-Birth if tagged with Goto as Birth. Kamen Rider Battride Wars Akira Date appears as his Kamen Rider Birth persona, a Second Rider in the video game Kamen Rider Battride Wars. In OOO's narration story chapter, Date still remained as Birth, without Goto's help, different than the films where Goto is Birth and Date aids him as Birth Prototype. He is the one of the four and the first surviving secondary Neo-Heisei Riders along with Accel and Meteor, joined by Beast. Birth is a heavy-type character, with his play style in a term of grapplings. Almost like Blade, Birth's strategy is to used points in via attacks, in order to use many types of gadgets for attacks or/and specials. Abilities Medicine Date is a skilled combat medic with years of experience under his belt. He is able to treat people's wounds with whatever he has on him and figure out the best way possible to treat them. Forms Kamen Rider Birth's ending theme is entitled "Reverse/Re:birth". is the first design of the Kamen Rider Birth System using an early version of the Birth Driver. Its full combat capabilities are not known because it was designed to only operate at 70% power for testing and nearly all of its features are still set up for data collection. The Birth Prototype's design differs from the standard Kamen Rider Birth armor by having a series of markings known as , which include various sensors used in the early test stages, and are a bright red to show up more easily on camera. It cannot access all of the Birth CLAWs units, and is only compatible with the Crane Arm and Breast Cannon. Shintaro Goto first uses the Prototype system after the production version is heavily damaged in the final fight with Kazari. Later, Akira Date returned to Japan and became the user of the Prototype Version to end the Greeed conflict. The Birth Prototype Driver is later damaged by Poseidon during the events of Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Fourze & OOO: Movie War Megamax. It was later fixed after the event, as Akira was once more became Birth Prototype in Kamen Rider × Super Sentai: Super Hero Taisen against Gokai Red and Bio Hunter Silva, and later against Dai-Shocker and Dai-Zangyack. - Birth= , in which the Birth CLAWs system is stored until a Cell Medal is used to summon the weapons. It was first thought that, due to using Cell Medals as opposed to Core Medals, Birth was, at first, at a disadvantage against the Greeed. However, as Kamen Rider Birth, Shintaro shows an extreme proficiency in utilizing the system, single-handedly combating three Greeeds on even grounds by strategically using the Cutter Wings, Caterpillar Legs, and Shovel Arms until he uses all CLAWs weapons in Birth Day Mode to defeat them, surpassing his predecessor, Akira Date, who wasn't capable fighting against an single Greeed. Kamen Rider Birth's exosuit originally had a self-destruct function built into it. However, the self-destruct function was disabled by Shintaro Goto when Kiyoto Maki defected to the Greeed side. - Birth CLAWs= The green unit, referred to as the , is a powerful winch attachment that is contained in the Receptacle Orb on Kamen Rider Birth's right shoulder. The winch allows him to scale buildings as well as collecting any leftover Cell Medals with one sweep. As a weapon, it can be used as a whip to damage opponents from far. This unit is first used by Nobunaga to fight the Pteranodon Yummy in Movie War Core. When CLAWs Sasori is activated, the Crane Arm forms the tail. - Breast Cannon= Breast Cannon The red unit, referred to as the , is a powerful energy cannon that is held in the Receptacle Orb on Kamen Rider Birth's chest. Due to its size, using it hinders Kamen Rider Birth's mobility. The cannon can be charged up to multiple levels of power by using additional Cell Medals. When CLAWs Sasori is activated, the Breast Cannon forms the head. - Drill Arm= Drill Arm The blue , referred to as the , is held in the Receptacle Orb on Kamen Rider Birth's right forearm. Its powerful drill bit can extract Cell Medals from the bodies of Greeed and Yummy. It was eventually upgraded by Doctor Maki to increase its power after it got broken, allowing it to tear enough Cell Medals out of Kazari's hybrid Yummy to reduce them to a normal one. The Drill Arm can also be combined with the Crane Arm by activating both simultaneously, allowing Birth to use it as a powerful ranged attack. When CLAWs Sasori is activated, the Drill Arm forms the stinger. - Catepillar Leg= Catepillar Leg The purple , referred to as the , are held in Receptacle Orbs on Kamen Rider Birth's legs, and allow him to move easily over tough terrain and execute heavy kicks and grind on opponents using its tracks. When CLAWs Sasori is activated, the Caterpillar Legs form the lower body. - Shovel Arm= Shovel Arm The orange , referred to as the , is held in the Receptacle Orb on Kamen Rider Birth's left forearm, increasing his power to where he can lift Yummy off of the ground with it. When CLAWs Sasori is activated, the Shovel Arm forms the right claw. - Cutter Wing= Cutter Wing The yellow , referred to as the , is held in the Receptacle Orb on Kamen Rider Birth's back, allowing him to fly. The unit can also magnetically collect Cell Medals by flying over them. It can also be used as an oversized boomerang. When CLAWs Sasori is activated, the Cutter Wing forms the left claw. }} - Birth Day= is the name for when all six Birth CLAWs units are summoned and attached to Kamen Rider Birth. Costing six Cell Medals, it is extremely risky when Kamen Rider Birth activates this combination on his own, and requires Kamen Rider OOO to back him up. This form can also perform a powerful attack called , where the Breast Cannon fires a powerful energy blast without the expenditure of any Cell Medals. }} }} Behind the scenes Portrayal Akira Date is portrayed by . Iwanaga previously portrayed Chief Eiji Ishiguro in Tomica Hero: Rescue Force and later portrayed Shu Karasuma in Space Sheriff Gavan: The Movie. As Kamen Rider Birth, his suit actor was . As Kamen Rider Birth Proto Type in Super Hero Taisen, his suit actor was . Trivia *He never used the Cutter Wing on its own, only in Birth Day mode. Category:Kamen Riders Category:Kamen Rider OOO Category:OOO Riders Category:Heroes Category:Neo-Heisei Era Riders Category:Tech Riders Category:Proto Rider Category:Support Riders Category:Sniper Riders Category:Heisei Era Riders Category:Secondary Riders Category:Tertiary Riders